News

On Friday, the North-Caucasian Regional Military Court continued interrogation of prosecution witnesses in the case of two officers of Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federations accused of murdering peaceful residents in Chechnya.

Zurab Muzoshvili, a Georgian citizen, whom the authorities had intended to deport home, died in the reception-distribution centre of the city of Saratov, the Rustavi 2 TV Channel reported on Friday.

The 2006 report on violations of human rights in the Krasnodar Territory evidences a growth of pressure on civil activists and continuation of ethnic discrimination.

Ramzan Kadyrov, chairman of the Chechen government (prime minister), has expressed his bewilderment with publications and utterances of certain politicians and experts about his soon inauguration as Chechnya president.

Today, the Presnenskiy Court of Moscow has defeated the first one out of the 42 claims of the residents of the Chechen village of Borozdinovskaya lodged against the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation (RF).

The Nazran District Court of Ingushetia has rejected the claim of the "Mashr" Association of Relatives of Missing People demanding to qualify as illegal the actions of the Mayor's Office of the city of Nazran who prohibited to hold a picket in memory of Anna Politkovskaya.

A criminal case has been initiated in relation to Andrei Novikov, independent journalists from the city of Rybinsk, Yaroslavl Region, and permanent author of materials in the web site "Chechenpress" of non-recognized Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, under point 1, Article 280 of RF Criminal Code, for "sending two electronic letters with "extremist," in the opinion of prosecution, materials to local newspapers."

Ramzan Kadyrov, Prime Minister of Chechnya, intends to insist on revision of criminal cases in relation of the Chechens who got to prison under fabricated, as he thinks, allegations.

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) is going to call both Chambers of the Federal Assembly of Russia to hold an independent inquiry into the murder of journalist Anna Politkovskaya in October 2006.

On January 19, having served his complete sentence of two years at a general security corrective colony of the Nyrob settlement in the Perm Territory, Pavel Lyuzakov, permanent author of the "Kavkaz-Center" web-site of Chechen separatists and the editor of the "Svobodnoe Slovo" (Free Word) newspaper of the Democratic Union, got liberty.

On January 25, the Presnenskiy Court of Moscow will continue the process on the suit of 42 inhabitants of the village of Borozdinovskaya of the Shelkovskoj District of Chechnya towards the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation (RF).

In the evening of January 23, at Solovetskiy Boulder in the Lubyanka Square of Moscow, a picket was held in defence of the "Society of Russian-Chechen Friendship" (SRChF), after the court ruling to liquidation it was confirmed yesterday by the Supreme Court of Russia.

On Saturday, January 20, the Kremlin held discussions of the candidature of a president of Chechnya, who will soon replace Alu Alkhanov.

Today, at the North-Caucasian Regional Military Court (Rostov-on-Don), at the trial on the case of Evgeniy Khudyakov and Sergey Arakcheev, who are charged of murdering peaceful Chechens, Sergey Arakcheev has declared a challenge to the court.

"Our consciousness before Russia that we respect is clean. We have done everything for the country to preserve its dignity, but its authorities have smashed us down the pavement," Oksana Chelysheva, deputy executive director of the "Society of Russian-Chechen Friendship" (SRChF), gave her comments to the correspondent of the "Caucasian Knot" on the today's decision of the RF Supreme Court to uphold the verdict of the Nizhni Novgorod Regional Court to liquidate the organization.

The International Herald Tribune newspaper asserts in the article on the murder of Armenian journalist Hrant Dink in Turkey that Yasin Haial, the customer of the editor's murder, underwent training in Chechens' camps in Azerbaijan.

Today, the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation (RF) has upheld the decision of the Nizhni Novgorod Regional Court on liquidation of the inter-regional public organization "Society of Russian-Chechen Friendship" (SRChF).

On January 21, policemen forced a group of believers who wanted to honour the memory of shahids out of the Shahids' Alley in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan.

On December 26, 2006, the Prigorodny District of the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania (RNO-A) held a court session in the village of Oktiabrskoe on a civil suit of the administration of the Prigorodny District of the RNO-A and administration of the dwelling settlement Maiskiy of the RNO-A towards the residents of the refugees' settlement in Maiskiy (19 families).

Yuri Saveliev, a State Duma deputy and a member of the parliamentary commission for investigating the causes and circumstances of the act of terror in Beslan, has confirmed his readiness to deliver his alternative report on Beslan to the parliament of North Ossetia, should the deputies approve this decision.